Coal is stored outside the Hunter coal-fired power plant, operated by PacifiCorp, in Emery County on Wednesday, July 31, 2024. (Photo by Spenser Heaps for Utah News Dispatch)
Utah’s coal-fueled power plants are substantial contributors to hazy skies in the area’s national parks, but the state’s plan to mitigate that effect isn’t enough for the federal government.
The Environmental Protection Agency requires states to strategize with their neighbors to address regional haze — the visibility impairment produced by pollutants in a broad geographic area — and it is considering partially approving and partially disapproving Utah’s strategy to combat the haze, a move that environmentalists consider a step toward accountability.
A spokesperson at the Utah Department of Environmental Quality said the office is still working to understand the potential partial disapproval and next steps to strengthen its plan, but gave no further comment.
GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
While the EPA agrees with the portion of Utah’s assessment of several points on the status of haze in the state, including current visibility conditions and progress to date, the federal agency is considering rejecting the state’s long-term strategy, reasonable progress goals and federal land managers’ consultation, according to the rule proposal posted in August.
The EPA is also proposing to disapprove a portion of Utah’s infrastructure plan to control ozone that travels beyond state lines and impairs visibility. A final ruling is expected before Nov. 22.
EPA proposes new deadline to review Utah’s plan to combat regional haze in national parks
Utah cited PacifiCorp’s long-term plans to decrease activity in the coal-fired Hunter and Huntington plants, located in Emery County, as moves to increase renewable energy resources and energy storage capacity increase and coal units are scheduled to be retired or converted to natural gas.
According to Utah’s plan, affording emission controls is a concern, and requiring the plants to install selective catalytic reduction systems — a technology to reduce nitrogen oxide emissions — “could create the potential for involuntary closure of Hunter and Huntington units.”
The state recommended establishing an annual cap on emissions for the plants, instead of installing the reduction systems. However, the EPA argued that rejecting emission control measures in favor of emissions limits can only happen with the assumption of a utilization decrease, which isn’t the case for Utah.
The EPA said the proposal “unreasonably rejected” nitrogen oxides emission reduction measures at Hunter and Huntington; didn’t evaluate some emission reduction measures at CCI Paradox Lisbon Natural Gas Plant; and “improperly included automatic exemptions for startup, shutdown, and malfunction in the emission limitations for Intermountain power plant,” among others.
“Utah’s determination to impose plantwide annual mass-based emission limits will not secure any reduction in (nitrogen oxides) emissions from Hunter and Huntington,” the proposed rule reads.
In fact, according to the proposed rule, with the annual emission limits, the utilization levels at Huntington would increase by 7.75%, as well as 0.94% at Hunter, compared to the average utilization from 2015 to 2019.
“In other words, Utah set its mass-based emission limits at levels premised on an increased plant utilization scenario,” the EPA wrote.
A projected emissions inventory estimates that, combined, both plants may have accounted for 18.35% of man-made nitrogen oxides and 43.45% of sulfur dioxide emissions of the state in 2028.
Data from the Western Regional Air Partnership and other sources show that electric generating units in the state — Hunter and Huntington in particular — “make substantial contributions to anthropogenic visibility impairment at numerous” national parks. And the state’s proposed plan to control the plants’ emissions will not mitigate that.
And, notably, the proposed rule reads, unlike what the state indicated in its long-term plan, PacifiCorp hasn’t once stated an expectation to decrease the plants’ utilization.
“We disagree with Utah’s assertion that its (state implementation plan) submission includes ‘strong evidence that utilization of these facilities is likely to decrease in the future,’” the EPA wrote.
The EPA has also partially approved and partially disapproved the state implementation plans Utah submitted in 2008 and 2011. Then, the agency disapproved of the state’s determinations on two pollutants. After a couple of tries to fix those plans, the EPA approved the state’s submission in 2019.
Environmental activists read thousands of public comments on Utah’s regional haze strategy at the Capitol steps on Sep. 18, 2024. (Alixel Cabrera/Utah News Dispatch)
Environmentalists applaud the proposal
“The Environmental Protection Agency has rightfully rejected the ‘do nothing’ plan that Utah submitted to clean up our air and reduce haze hanging over our national parks,” Paula Decker, co-chair of the Sierra Club Utah chapter’s executive committee, said at an advocacy event last week.
During the event on the steps of the state Capitol that the Sierra Club described as a “filibuster,” volunteers read aloud about 6,000 public comments submitted to the EPA as part of the rule proposal process. Some of the members of the small group who showed up on Wednesday also delivered copies of the comments to Rocky Mountain Power, the Utah Department of Environmental Quality and the Utah Public Service Commission.
Maia Hernandez, a Salt Lake City resident, left one of those comments while visiting Arches National Park with a friend.
“I moved to Utah about five years ago. I most recently went to Arches. When I saw them, maybe a couple months ago, and even in the span of five years, it’s been a pretty visible difference in how the parks have been impacted by haze,” Hernandez said. “Specifically as a consequence of the coal polluters in the state.”
Many of the comments read during the event, Hernandez said, are centered around the lack of pollution controls.
“We’re not saying to have them stop running,” she said of the coal-powered plants. “But more so make sure that there are controls in place that facilitate the reduction of pollution from these plants, as well as hope for the eventual phase out.”
Utah, according to a Sierra Club database, PacifiCorp’s Hunter coal plant is No.1 in the country for contributing to haze in large national parks and national wilderness areas. The neighboring Huntington plant ranks 12 — both affect most predominantly Capitol Reef National Park’s visibility.
The Utah Department of Environmental Quality’s Division of Air Quality’s state implementation plan considering its five national parks — Arches, Bryce Canyon, Canyonlands, Capitol Reef and Zion, may face roadblocks in the future. If the EPA fully rejects it, the agency may step in with its own implementation plan.
It’s an action that Decker would like to see.
“A strong federal plan will direct polluting facilities in Utah to do what’s right, install pollution reduction technology that will drastically lower the amount of haze-causing and health-harming pollutants being dumped into our air,” she said. “A strong federal plan would enforce the common sense timeline for closing coal burning power plants in our state by 2030.”
SUPPORT NEWS YOU TRUST.